The PC is as pointless as the typewriter, says the man who invented it 30 years ago

The man who had a major hand in giving the world personal computers has declared they are now as tired as the typewriter - and will soon as dead as the dodo.

On the 30th anniversary of the first IBM PC, Doctor Mark Dean, one of its 12 designers, has taken to the internet to herald the PC's imminent passing.

'They're going the way of the vacuum tube, typewriter, vinyl records, CRT and incandescent light bulbs,' he wrote, admitting that back on August 12, 1981, when his IBM 5150 was unveiled at the Waldorf Astoria Ballroom in New York, he did not think he would live long enough to witness its decline.

With its 16k of RAM (barely enough for one Word document), no hard disk and price tag of just over $1,500, the IBM 5150 was one of the first signs computers could revolutionise the world.

But Dr Dean, who owns a third of the patents for the machine, believes that its direct descendants are now outmoded.

'I, personally, have moved beyond the PC,' he wrote in a blog post. 'My primary computer now is a tablet.

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'While PCs will continue to be much-used devices, they’re no longer at the leading edge of computing.

'PCs are being replaced at the center of computing not by another type of device — though there’s plenty of excitement about smart phones and tablets — but by new ideas about the role that computing can play in progress.

Game over: The original PC - an IBM 5150 from 1981

'These days, it’s becoming clear that innovation flourishes best not on devices but in the social spaces between them, where people and ideas meet and interact.

'It is there that computing can have the most powerful impact on economy, society and people’s lives.'

In a blog also marking the PC’s 30th anniversary, Frank Shaw of Microsoft claimed that the spread of new devices associated with computing was the start of the 'PC-plus era', rather than a sign of decline of traditional computing.

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The PC is as pointless as a typewriter, says the man who invented it 30 years ago